You Make Your Own Luck
by greenstuff2
Summary: what happens when love isn't enough and you have to do whatever it takes... This is the sequel to A Matter of Luck
1. Chapter 1

"Go on, fuck off and do what old soldiers do when they get together, go and make a bleeding pest of yourself somewhere, but if you come 'ome plastered, don't wake Parsnip up cos he needs 'is beauty sleep"

"Oi, you, not so much of the old" He stroked her hair back and tucked it behind her ears "Are you sure you're going to be okay?"

"Course I am, I'm a big girl now"

"Yeah, I'd noticed" Charles put his hand on Molly's stomach and laughed.

"That ain't funny, sod off"

Charles had very mixed feelings about going to his first reunion for years, actually the last one he'd been to had been when he'd first got involved with Rebecca. He'd all but lost touch with the lads who'd played such a significant role in his life before he'd been injured and before his life had gone to shit, and he remembered now that the last time he'd seen them he'd been deeply 'in love' with the girl who'd become his wife. He'd cut his evening short and stayed stone cold sober, swapping to soft drinks and water very early on, knowing that she didn't approve of him being there and had done everything in her power to persuade him not to go, so that, to his eternal shame, he'd started to see them through her eyes. Oil and water didn't begin to describe it.

The invitation to attend this one had come in the form of a 'round robin' note inside a re-directed Christmas card from Derek Kinders which Molly had opened and had then promptly started hassling him into accepting. She kept saying that it would do him good to stop being such a miserable anti-social kill-joy, or bleeding wet blanket pain in the arse as she called it, which he knew was more to do with the on-going discussions they'd been having about his reluctance to go to Doreen's Christmas party than anything else. He couldn't forget what Molly had said about Doreen having the hot's for him, so he was deeply uncomfortable around her and didn't want to go anywhere where he might find himself having to kiss her, even on the cheek, but admitting that to Molly meant she would have taken the piss endlessly.

She'd got her own way in the end and Boxing Day had seen them at Doreen's, and he'd almost enjoyed himself when he managed to forget that he had to avoid his hostess at all costs, something that would have been much easier if they'd got a taxi rather than him driving, several very large drinks would have helped considerably. They hadn't stayed late, neither of them could drink and everyone else was merrily plastered so that when he'd whispered that she was his gorgeous little womble as she'd sat on his lap, knowing how much the nickname annoyed her, and that he wanted to go home, that he loved her and wanted her to himself and that he was tired of sharing her with other people, Molly had shushed him, worried that people would hear and start taking the piss. He'd shouted with laughter saying that he didn't think they were a secret and then patted her bump and said that he was sure most people knew about them already.

The certainty that Molly and the lads would get on, that they'd adore her almost as much as they would have hated Rebecca, meant that he had this germ of an idea that he could re-establish the friendship they'd always shared under the umbrella of the officer and section relationship they'd had. But only time would tell whether anything like that was even remotely possible, after the last time they might well have written him off as that arrogant bloody Rupert who'd forgotten all about shared troubles, fears and fun, the upshot of which was that he was actually filled with some trepidation about the evening ahead.

-OG-

"Boss man, how the fuck are you?"

"Fine thanks, how are you? You look well"

"We heard you'd got married, let you off the lead for a couple of hours, has she?"

"Yeah, well, something like that, actually this was her idea, personally I couldn't think of anything worse than going out and getting pissed with you load of massive cockwombles"

"That's nice, innit?"

Charles slapped Dangles on the back as he and Nude-Nut pretended to be deeply offended at what he'd just said. The evening was progressing very much as he'd expected, or rather hoped for, they'd eaten in an Indian, Kinders insisting that they had to eat before they started drinking otherwise he wouldn't be responsible for anything that followed, and were now happily embedded in a bar and looking as if they were there for the duration as Mansfield and some of the others tried to drink themselves into oblivion. The one thing he hadn't expected was the ease with which he'd slipped back into his previous sense of belonging, the friendship and camaraderie that he'd missed over the intervening years had just effortlessly reappeared.

"So, how's the wife, Rebecca isn't it?"

Kinders obviously had a good memory which impressed Charles, but he was considerably more sober than the rest of them, including Charles, who was trying to pace himself because he hadn't been out on the sauce for a long time and had no intention of getting totally plastered.

"Yes well, that is my wife's name, or rather it was, but we're not together any more, we're actually divorced, things got a bit complicated"

"I'm sorry"

"I'm not, things couldn't be better right now" Charles wondered why people kept expressing sympathy when he told them that he and Rebecca had split up, they didn't know why they'd split or whose idea it had been, and even Molly had said she was sorry, so that he had to keep explaining that he'd never been happier.

"I'm with someone else" He knew that he was grinning all over his face "Been with her for a while actually, we're going to have a baby in just over a month, a little girl, so everything's pretty good right now, what with Molly and the business"

Charles got his mobile phone out of his pocket to show Kinders his screensaver picture of Molly laughing as she cuddled Parsnip, knowing just how incredibly pretty she looked and how proud he was of her. He had a suspicion that when his daughter was born he was going to be one of those sad fuckers who flashed photographs of their kids at every opportunity whether people were interested or not. The discussion with Kinders moved onto the business as Charles resisted the temptation to ring her and check that she was okay, he knew she'd be fine on her own with the dog and she'd already told him more than once that he was driving her nuts checking up on her all the time, and if he was like this now, what the hell was he going to be like once Lexie was born?

"What the fuck do you want?"

"Just checking you're okay"

"Course I'm okay. Shit, you ain't been arrested or nothing 'ave you?"

"No, of course not, I'll probably get a taxi in a bit and come home"

"Only if you've had enough, and I ain't talking about the booze, just don't come home early for me, I'm good"

"I love you"

"Course you do"

An hour after his conversation with Kinders the temptation to check on her had got too much for him and two hours after that he began to think it would be a very good idea to do what he'd promised, get a taxi and make his way home. It was now very late and apart from anything else he definitely didn't want another drink, he'd already offered all of 2 section a job each at Parker James, jobs which Eddie would be amazed to know existed, so it would be just his luck if they all decided to take him up on his outstandingly generous offers.

-OG-

"What do you want now?"

"Molly?"

"Oh sorry Mr. James, I thought you was Charles again"

"He's not there then I take it? And Molly, it's Bill or Dad, not Mr. James"

"No, he's at a reunion thingy with 'is army mates, can I 'elp?"

"Not really, can you just tell him I wanted a word and perhaps he could ring me tomorrow or I can ring him"

"I'll ask 'im to ring you but it won't be that early, this might be a bit of a late one"

"What you mean is he'll have a sore head in the morning"

Molly still had a somewhat strained relationship with Charles' parents, his dad was okay, even if she couldn't possibly bring herself to call him Bill, and she already had a dad of her own, even if he was a compete tosser, so she usually tried to avoid calling him anything at all. "Oi you" or "mate" didn't seem appropriate somehow. Elizabeth James, or Betsy as Bill called her, was the fly in the ointment. For some reason she was firmly convinced that Molly was responsible for the breakdown of Charles' marriage and his ultimate divorce and her conviction that this was the case was completely unshakeable. Not even the news that she was about to become a grandmother had changed her attitude towards Molly, she was implacable in her dislike and disapproval so that Charles had ended up distancing himself from his parents once again, actually even more than he had when he hadn't wanted to tell them that Rebecca had waltzed off with Mr Muscles.

Charles couldn't help feeling that Molly was missing out on the family anticipation and excitement that she deserved for the impending arrival of Lexie, her Nan was knitting rather misshapen woollen things and had given them a couple of very expensive looking baby dresses, which had made Molly giggle when she told him that they were more than likely moody, or shoplifted from somewhere, much to his horror. She hadn't, however, heard a single word from her mother or her sisters and he was very angry and disappointed that apparently neither of Lexie's grandmothers seemed to give a shit, and that not even Molly's sisters seemed to care. Doreen was the one who was much more excited than they were.

-OG-

" 'ave a good time did we?"

"How the hell would I know? And what the fuck am I doing down here sleeping on the sofa with Parsnip?"

"You couldn't make the stairs, maybe?"

"Oh shit, never again, and I've got a horrible feeling I might have done some stupid stuff last night" Charles sat on the edge of the sofa with his head in his hands and pulled up Parsnip's dog blanket that he'd been sleeping under and wrapped it round his shoulders; he felt like grim death "And I think I've got the flu"

"Yeah, course you 'ave" Molly couldn't stop giggling unsympathetically at his plight "And what sort of stupid, anything I need to worry about?"

"I think I might have offered them all jobs and I bet they know fuck all about printing and I bet it'll be Mansfield who'll be the first to take me up on it, its bloody well bound to be, and what the fuck is so funny?"

"You are, and what's wrong with Mansfield?"

"Don't ask"

"Your dad rang last night"

"Lovely. What the hell did he want?"

"I dunno, 'e didn't say, well 'e wasn't gonna tell me was 'e? 'e's wants you to ring 'im"

"Shit, must I?"

"Yup, and go and 'ave a shower first, you're minging"

"Will you make me a coffee? pretty please, because you love me and because I'm dying here"

"Uuuummmmm"

Despite all their months together and the impending arrival of Lexie, Molly had never put her commitment to him, to their being together, to their home, to their baby or to anything else into words, and she still talked about them as if they were temporary; she hadn't ever told him that she loved him, something he now craved because he didn't understand why not. The only people she ever talked about loving were Eddie and Doreen, sometimes her Nan, and she adored Parsnip, but she never mentioned her mother, her father or her siblings, he wasn't even sure that she'd given them her new address, and they were always the ones to visit her Nan, never the other way round.

-OG-

The conversation seemed to go on a very long time, much, much longer than any other conversation Molly could remember him having with his father, although his previous conversations, when he hadn't been giving them the distant treatment, had always been with his mother; either she'd rung him or if he'd rung them his father had immediately passed the phone to Betsy. And this seemed to be an almost totally one-sided conversation, Charles was saying very little, just drinking black coffee and listening, then throwing in the occasional question as a prompt; a 'why' or a 'what happened', but Molly knew that he was worried because of the number of times he rubbed the back of his neck and bit his bottom lip.

"He's worried about Mum, apparently she's a bit upset because she hasn't seen me, us, for a while and she's not too well, so he wants us to go down next weekend"

"Us?" Molly laughed "You, you mean"

"I'm not going without you"

"Nah, you go, I'll stop 'ome and look after Parsnip"

"We'll take Parsnip with us or he can go to the Kennels, I'm not going without you"

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Yes it's me, I'm back, can't get away from me for too long. This is a sequel to 'A Matter of Luck' so please read and review, it's always difficult to pick up the threads without spoiling the original feel-good ending, but things may be about to get a little bit tricky ….**


	2. Chapter 2

"So what's wrong with 'er then?"

"I don't know exactly. Dad says she gets a bit vague sometimes especially if he goes out and leaves her on her own, which he has to do a fair bit what with his golf and his council work, and she gets a bit upset which makes her more muddled and she keeps going on about me, why I, why we haven't been to see her"

"Nah, you 'ad it right the first time, it's you she wants to see, not me"

They had been having similar conversations to the one they'd had after his phone call with his dad every evening for almost a week and were now on their way to Bath, much against Molly's better judgement, she had absolutely no wish to spend the weekend with Charles' parents, who as far as she was concerned hated her, and she loathed the fact that they'd put a woebegone Parsnip into kennels, because Charles' Dad didn't really like dogs and hadn't thought it was a good idea to take him with them. Right up till the time they'd left Bow she'd been manufacturing good reasons and fanciful excuses why he should go on his own, until he'd looked at her with his best beaten puppy dog expression and said "Okay, but if you're not going, I'm not going either" which meant that guilt had forced her into the car, although she still kept telling him that it was going to cost him, she just hadn't decided what yet.

Despite two loo stops Molly was once again desperate for a pee when they got to Royal Crescent. Lexie was firmly squashing her bladder meaning that she had the capacity of about an egg cup whenever she sat down and it had been a long way to sit in the car, apart from which she was thirsty, stiff and crumpled, not very warm and in not in the best of moods, dreading the next few hours.

There was no sign of Betsy when they got into the hallway although Bill was making all the right noises of welcome. Molly had only been to the house once before when she'd found it intimidatingly posh so that she couldn't for the life of her imagine living there with Charles and their baby much as he kept telling her that it would be her home eventually, and then laughing at the appalled expression on her face as she tried to imagine cleaning those bloody stairs for a start, let alone the rest of it. They tracked Betsy down in the kitchen where she was washing up the lunch dishes, ignoring the perfectly good dishwasher, whereupon Bill explained that she didn't think it got things clean enough. Molly couldn't help thinking that she would be perfectly happy with dishwasher clean if only there was space in their miniscule kitchen to fit one in.

"Mum" Charles smiled as he kissed her on the cheek, looking really pleased to see her which made Molly feel slightly guilty that they were a bit estranged and that if the truth was told she hadn't really wanted him to come today either. The fact that she knew they didn't like her made her feel very uncomfortable.

"Charles, what a lovely surprise, what on earth are you doing here?" There was an awkward silence, Bill had assured them that she knew they were coming and had said how much she had been looking forward to seeing them so either he was lying or she'd forgotten "And Rebecca as well, how lovely to see you, we haven't seen you for such a long time"

"No Mum, this isn't Rebecca, it's Molly, Rebecca and I aren't, um ….… together anymore"

"Of course not, sorry, I'm no good with names, hello Molly, how nice to meet you"

"Don't be so silly Betsy, you've met Molly before"

A fleeting expression of confusion on Betsy's face at Bill's impatient comment made Molly feel a bit sorry for her, there was obviously something wrong here which Bill's irritable outburst hadn't helped at all. She didn't know whether Charles had noticed the exchange, he seemed to be too busy talking about Parker James and his dad's golf lessons and laughing about his army reunion to pay that much attention to the troubled expression on his mother's face and her obsessive scrubbing of a perfectly clean saucepan.

" 'ere, let me 'elp you" Molly grabbed a tea-towel and started drying up, as Charles and his dad left the room and Molly wondered whether she could ask for a cup of tea. She was parched and still needed the loo.

"Thank you …um ….… um ….… dear" Betsy had obviously forgotten her name again, but before Molly could remind her, she went on with a puzzled frown on her face "Who are you again, dear? Are you a friend of Rebecca's?"

"No, I'm Molly, I'm Charles' friend" Shit, where the fuck had Charles buggered off to anyway? Molly considered making an excuse and going to find him and to use the loo, the inconsiderate pig was supposed to be here seeing his mum, not sodding off with his dad leaving her here on her own not knowing what to say next.

"Shall I make a cuppa?" Apart from her thirst, it meant that she could take refuge in doing something instead of standing around like a spare part, and it would give her an excuse to yell for Charles and his dad to come back to the kitchen and rescue her.

It was when she lifted the kettle to fill it that she found the first post-it note on the worktop. It was under the kettle and said simply 'kettle' and there was one marked 'tea' stuck on the top inside the canister, and one on the mug tree as well, so that she knew Betsy was having trouble remembering what everyday things were called, and that she was the same as Nan's pal from years ago, the one who'd ended up going into a home but Molly couldn't remember her name or what'd happened to her afterwards.

The rest of the day seemed slightly unreal to Molly, Charles seemed oblivious to his mother's peculiar behaviour, the fact that she was swinging from what seemed to be 100% normal, chatting and laughing, to being completely confused and his dad wasn't helping, pulling faces and being irritable and snapping at her when she got a bit muddled and forgot what she was saying, which made her worse.

"She doesn't seem too bad, I think Dad might have exaggerated a bit" They were sitting side by side on the bed in Charles' old room and Molly couldn't help noticing how dusty and grubby everything was compared to the last time they'd slept there.

"Where 'ave you been all afternoon?" Molly couldn't believe that Charles really hadn't noticed how much his mother had struggled through the afternoon and the evening and how much effort she'd had to make as she got more and more tired "She's 'aving a complete mare, Charles, so don't start pretending there's nothing wrong, and your dad ain't 'elping getting ratty with 'er like that"

"Yes, I know" He sighed deeply and shook his head "I'm not sure what to do, she's got an appointment at the hospital on Thursday and now Dad doesn't want to go with her"

"What do you mean, 'e doesn't wanna go? 'e'll have to go, she can't go on 'er own"

"He isn't good at this sort of thing, never has been, she's always been the one who takes care of stuff"

"Oh poor 'im, my 'eart bleeds for 'im"

"Don't be nasty, it's hard for him"

"I'm not being nasty, actually I like 'er better like this, she's forgotten that she 'ates me" Molly nudged Charles who reluctantly smiled at her "And It's a bleeding sight 'arder for 'er than it is for 'im, especially as he keeps getting narky with 'er"

"I know. I might have to come down to go with her, I mean I know you won't want to …"

"Charles, she don't even know who I am, I 'eard 'er ask your dad who the girl with the belly was, although she didn't say belly, she sort of drew it with 'er 'ands, and she kept forgetting me name, then called me Rebecca twice, and said about the 'ouse in Richmond, so she wouldn't want me there anyhow"

"No, but …..…"

"I still think your dad should go, 'e's the one who knows what's been going on and 'e's the one what's been writing out 'er little labels 'n that"

"What labels, what are you talking about?"

"She 'as these labels on things like the kettle cos she can't remember what things are called"

"Oh shit!"

Their journey home was very quiet, apart from Molly asking him to stop at each set of services so that she could use the loo. Charles was very much the "I'm so bleeding miserable" snappy bastard that Molly had first known and she didn't like him one little bit in that mood, although she understood how worried he was about his mum she didn't see why he had to take it out on her. Parsnip was absolutely thrilled to see her and was actually whimpering with joy, which made her feel a whole lot better, even though Charles barely smiled at the performance the dog put on, and just marched off and plugged in his lap top as soon as he'd taken the bags into the house. He'd done his best to find out from his dad how long it had all been going on and whether it was getting worse and why the hell no-one had told him before and was now desperately googling to find out as much as he could, and what treatments were out there.

" 'ow long are you going to be like this?"

"Like what?"

"Being a miserable sod and being 'orrible to me?"

"I'm not being horrible and I wouldn't expect you to understand, she's my mum Molly, she was always there when I was a kid and when Dad was away it was always just the two of us, and anyway you don't _do_ family, do you?"

"What, like when she sent you off to boarding school you mean? And I 'ave got a family, thanks very much, just cos I don't go on about them all the time" Molly knew she shouldn't have said anything about boarding school, it was spiteful and unfair, but she was incredibly hurt at what he'd just said about her not understanding and thought he was being unnecessarily nasty about something he knew she was very sensitive about.

"Meaning I do?" Charles could hear himself lashing out at her and knew he should stop; none of it was her fault. She slammed the door as she flung out of the room in tears and he knew he should go after her and apologise, being nasty to Molly wasn't going to wave a magic wand and make things okay again.

-OG-

"Don't worry Mum, everything's going to be fine" He had ended up taking her on his own, his father had asked him to accompany them so that the three of them could go together and had then made some excuse about urgent council business, something that Charles hadn't believed for a second, and he wasn't sure how much his mother had understood about her husband of forty odd years running away from the reality of the day. Charles had set off from Bow before dawn and had left Molly apparently fast asleep, although he had his doubts.

"Your Dad's not very happy"

"Don't worry about Dad, he'll be fine, let's just get things sorted for you so that you can stop worrying, but Mum you have to try and remember that I'm not with Rebecca anymore, that I'm with Molly and we're going to have a baby, a little girl, so that's something to look forward to isn't it, your granddaughter?"

"Was that Molly who came here with you once, a long time ago?"

"It wasn't a long time ago Mum, it was just a few days, and yes that's Molly, she's got dark hair and Rebecca was blonde, remember?" He smiled not wanting to acknowledge that Molly had visited once before quite a while ago, when his mother had been really vile to her, ignoring her most of the time because she blamed her for his separation from Rebecca and making it very plain that Molly didn't match up to their expectations, but he was sure his mother was referring to the previous weekend. He didn't hold out much hope that she'd taken in what he was telling her, it had been a very long day and she was tired and the consultant had explained that the condition got very much worse when she was tired. "Molly and I are planning to get married after Lexie's born, so you'll enjoy that as well, won't you?"

The consultant had emphasised that it was important that his mother attended the memory clinics at the hospital and that they did their best to give her things to look forward to, even if she kept forgetting what they were and that, most of all, they were patient with her. Charles wasn't looking forward to the conversation with his dad about that one.

For the first time since Eddie's retirement party he wasn't sure of Molly, of anything. He knew he'd been horribly unfeeling and uncaring towards her the last few days, locked into some hideous nightmare that he'd taken out on her, refusing all her attempts at peace-making, so that she wasn't speaking to him at all now and he wasn't sure he could blame her. In less than two weeks the happy bubble he'd been living in had burst and he'd gone from wanting to ring her all the time they were apart to putting off the moment when he'd have to call and tell her he was staying over in Bath. Things were definitely not going to improve when he told her what was going to have to happen next; he couldn't see him being able to rely on his Dad, and admitted, probably for the first time ever, that his father was actually pretty selfish especially where his mum was concerned.

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Thank you for reading and reviewing and for your kind comments I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Thank you also to our Australian readers, especially the one who talked about her children's winter break from school, I think we've got your normal weather here today, because we're having a sodding heatwave, but then I'm obviously a typical Brit, I moan when it's cold, moan when it's wet, moan when it's dry and I moan like stink when its bloody hot like this, never satisfied.**


	3. Chapter 3

"When will you be 'ome then?"

"Tomorrow, I'll go straight to work from here and then come home at the usual time"

"So, 'ow did it go, what did they say?"

"Not great, but I'll tell you all about it when I get home, are you okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"No reason, I'll see you tomorrow"

It was the first time he hadn't ended a call by telling her that he loved her and he had a nasty suspicion that she had been or was crying, but he couldn't bring himself to call her back as pride got in the way when he remembered how stroppy she'd been towards him the previous evening and he did something he hadn't done for years and sulked. He told himself that she should understand how he was feeling, that he wasn't just being sorry for himself and that anyone would feel the same in his shoes.

3.34 in the morning and Charles was wide awake, reminiscent of the times just after Rebecca had left him when he'd had the most appalling insomnia. He couldn't call her now, she'd be fast asleep and he'd scare the shit out of her if he rang at this time, but he was filled with the most awful regret, asking himself what the hell had possessed him to behave like such a dick. He loved her, she loved him, even if she didn't say so, they had a life together, they were going to have a baby in a few weeks and here he was behaving like an utter jerk because his mum was sick and he felt like a kid instead of an adult with responsibilities, he was scared and out of his depth, and instead of sharing how he felt, he'd just lashed out.

-OG-

"So you want to move back and live in Bath to look out for your mum?"

"Yep, can't think what else I can do"

"What about the business, you just gonna dump that, dump Eddie and all the people what work there? And if you do that, what we gonna live on?"

"I haven't worked out how I'm going to manage things yet"

"What about me and Lexie, 'ave you thought about 'ow you're gonna manage us yet?"

"You'll come with me of course, it'll be great for Lexie, lovely big garden to play in, nice schools"

"Lovely big 'ouse for her mum to clean while she's looking out for her gran to save everyone else the hassle"

"Don't be ridiculous, it's not like that"

"Innit? Where's your dad gonna be while all this is going on? And what about you, what are you gonna do? And what about Parsnip? Your dad don't like dogs, won't 'ave 'im in the 'ouse, so what you gonna do with 'im? Give 'im away, take 'im to Battersea, or 'ave 'im put down? What?"

"Stop it, Molls, now you really are being ridiculous. Look, its family, and I don't expect you to understand but I'm just trying to do what's best for everyone"

"Yeah and of course I wouldn't understand about family, right?" She was trying her best not to lose her temper and get upset, the tears of angry frustration weren't far away "You know absolutely nothing about my family, so just shut up about me not understanding. I know you're trying to do your best and I can see that it's most likely the best for Betsy and for Bill, and maybe it'll be okay for you as well, but tell Eddie and Doreen and Bert that it's best for them and see whether they agree with you. Oh no, they're not family are they?"

"What about you?"

"I dunno, but I can't see how walking away from the business that you've worked so hard for, dragging me away from everything and everyone, just so as your Dad can pretend he's Tiger Woods or the other one, you know, Rory something or other, so that 'e doesn't have to take care of your mum at all, is right. And it's not that I don't care about your mum being ill, cos I do, but you need to talk things through with your dad, see what's best 'n that, not just decide that you've gotta sort everything out yourself and change your whole life so your dad don't need to change anything"

Any doubts about the course of action he'd decided on had been swept away that morning when he'd been preparing to leave Bath for the drive to work. Betsy had suddenly started talking as though he was setting off back to boarding school after a weekend's leave at home and had kept asking him whether he'd got his clean rugby kit and had he got his homework, and had he finished it, fussing around him as she used to when he was that schoolboy, and constantly reminding him of the need to write to let them know he was okay. Charles had followed the advice of the consultant to try not to correct her or get impatient with her, but his dad had snapped "Oh for God's sake" and slammed the dishwasher door as he put his cup in, giving her a look of complete exasperation before he'd banged out of the kitchen.

He knew he should tell Molly all about it, but he was tired after his broken night and long day and didn't want to start talking about what was happening or how it made him feel, and how worried he was; putting it into words made it all feel far too real and he still couldn't get away from the feeling that she should somehow know and understand without him having to spell it out for her. She had a point when she said that he didn't know anything about her family, when they'd first got together he'd wanted to know all about what Eddie had described as her dysfunctional childhood, about what had caused her terrible claustrophobia, and why she didn't have any real contact with her family, apart from spasmodically with her Nan, but that desire to know had got lost somewhere and he was no wiser now than he had been then.

What he needed most was a hug, a cuddle, not necessarily sex, but something that made everything just recede for a bit, but her rigid back told him all he wanted to know and he was still being obstinate, still expecting her to know what he needed and still buggered if he was going to ask, anyway he didn't want to give her any opportunity to reject him.

-OG-

His third trip to Bath in less than two weeks and another day away from the office was accompanied by driving rain which was rapidly turning to sleet, a grim greyness which matched his mood. Molly had refused point blank to go with him saying she preferred the company of the dog and anyway, she was tired, his tossing and turning all night had meant that she hadn't got much sleep either and the baby had kicked seven bells out of her when he'd finally managed to drop off, meaning that she couldn't. He'd told his dad that he was coming down so that they could have a talk about what was best for Betsy and the rest of them and it would have been far more convenient for him to go at the weekend, but he had a strong suspicion from his father's attitude that he would cite all his golfing commitments and his council social arrangements as reasons not to be there and it was going to be very difficult anyway to get any sort of co-operation out of him at all.

"Okay, so you won't sell the house and move nearer to London, you can't move away from your golf and the council, Mum can't manage without a bit of help sometimes and you can't have someone coming in every day because you don't want a stranger in the house and you can't spend more time with her yourself because you find it hard, you get too impatient, so what's your answer Dad?"

"I don't know, what do you suggest?"

"I'm completely out of magic wands, except for putting Mum into a home and that is definitely not going to happen, you know I've got a business to run in London which is too far from here to commute, and we can't expect Molly to just drop everything and move down here to look after mum during the week while I come back at the weekends, and she's going to have a baby to look after in the next couple of weeks, and it's not like you made much of an effort with her before all this, is it?"

"Surely she can do it for family?"

"Dad! Why the hell should she? She's got her own family so I'm not sure she will, no, in fact I know that she won't and who can blame her"

They were going round in circles which was pretty much what Charles knew he should have expected, his dad was trying his level best to make it everyone else's job to look after Betsy with the minimum inconvenience to him and was basically waiting for Charles to take over and absolve him of any responsibility so that he was suddenly reminded of Molly's remark about his dad trying to be Tiger Woods. All his life he had been brought up with the idea that unquestioning obedience was what his father was entitled to, in fact, it was what he deserved and that his father's word was absolute law, and suddenly Charles could see that for what it was, his mother's fantasy of what a father should be and it was a complete load of bollocks. There was no way he was going to be that sort of dad to Lexie.

-OG-

He'd decided not to stay over, his mother was having a much better day so that for a few minutes he wondered whether it had all been some sort of ghastly mistake, but knew when he looked at her eyes that were so empty of expression that, unfortunately, this was just one of the good days the consultant had talked about and that tomorrow might well be a whole different ball bag as Molly would say. He also realised that the more he stepped in to help and to try and solve everything for everyone, the less his father felt obliged to do anything even vaguely helpful, and the less he felt obliged to do, the more it freed him up to live his life the way he'd always done. They'd spent the whole day talking round and round in circles, and had come up with precisely nothing, no meaningful plan at all, so that he was tired and frustrated and more than a little infuriated with his father.

Charles knew he was going to have to do some serious grovelling when he got home, it wasn't that he'd hurt her accidentally, or even without thinking, he'd lashed out at her quite deliberately and when he'd been talking to his father and laying out the facts he'd suddenly woken up to himself and to what he'd been doing and he'd cringed. He hadn't called her to tell her he wasn't staying in Bath, in fact he hadn't spoken to her all day, mainly because he didn't know exactly what to say, 'sorry' seemed a bit inadequate somehow. So he just got in the car and headed home, hoping that she would forgive him with her usual mix of a hug and the threat of a swift slap round the side of his head if he ever did anything like it again.

-OG-

The absence of the dog tearing down the hallway at the sound of his key in the lock gave him the first intimation that something wasn't quite right, there were no lights left burning anywhere so Molly hadn't just taken Parsnip out for a quick walk round the block and she was unlikely to have gone out on her own so late in the evening anyway, and he knew instantly by the unnatural feel of the silence in the house that she wasn't there either. Not that that stopped him racing round the place flicking lights on and calling her name as panic set in that she'd gone into labour when he'd been dicking about with his father in Bath, so that even now she was in hospital and that their daughter might already have been born without him being there or even knowing. Eventually common sense took over from the blind panic as he told himself she would have rung him, no matter how much they'd been fighting or how much of a prick he'd been in the last week or so, she would have wanted him there with her, and it didn't explain the absence of Parsnip either, she could hardly have taken him with her.

He climbed back up the stairs like an old man, the relief he'd felt as he realised he was over-reacting making the muscles in his legs turn to jelly as he went into the spare bedroom they'd converted into a nursery and sat on the floor, resting his head back against the wall, the soft rocking chair was still shrouded in shrink wrapped plastic, and he looked around at the soft white walls with their Peter Rabbit frieze. Molly had refused point blank to have anything remotely Disney Princess related or pink, saying that there was plenty of time for Lexie to be brainwashed when she was a bit older, and he looked through eyes that were getting suspiciously blurred at the cot that he'd had such a nightmare assembling. Molly had wet herself laughing at him trying to decipher the instructions and then they'd stood and smiled at each other as they'd looked with pride at the finished article and gone to bed to celebrate how clever they'd been. He wasn't quite sure whether that had referred to assembling the cot or making the baby that was destined to sleep in it, but it hadn't mattered at the time and that had only been a little more than a month ago. And now he'd fucked things up so thoroughly that she'd gone.

Even though she hadn't left a note, there were three places she could possibly have gone, as, without even contemplating her family home in east Ham, he dismissed the first two bolt holes because she'd taken her beloved Parsnip with her and he couldn't see the dog in Nan's one bedroom flat in the tower block, and Doreen had made no bones about the fact that she disliked dogs as much as his dad did. She always gave Parsnip a very wide berth when she visited, despite all Molly's reassurances that he wouldn't hurt a fly, so Charles was pretty sure that Molly would have run to Eddie's.

He wanted to ring her and considered doing just that for a few minutes, either calling her mobile or Eddie's land line, but it was past 1.00 in the morning, so he plumped for going round there first thing before work, and then went downstairs and helped himself to a very large scotch, he didn't want to resign himself to another sleepless night when he'd inevitably start contemplating what he'd do if she wasn't actually at Eddie's. That didn't bear thinking about.

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Thank you for your reviews, as many of you have said this is a difficult subject, but I like to try and tackle something other than fluff occasionally. I have telescoped the passage of some of the symptoms that Betsy might suffer from (everyone's different, there is no definitive symptom list or time scale) because I didn't want it to become a medical diary, it's more to do with the way her illness and their family responsibilities affect them as a couple and how it impacts on their relationships, both with each other and their wider families.**

 **In the next Chapter, pulling together starts to seem more of a possibility…**


	4. Chapter 4

"What are you doing here, doll?"

"I thought maybe you'd let us" she pointed at Parsnip "him and me, stay for a day or two, it won't be for long, I'll sort something, but I couldn't think of anywhere else to go"

"Where else would you go? Come in so we can stop letting all the heat out" He opened the door wider and stepped to one side for her to pass and pretended not to notice the red-rimmed eyes and the tears that had started trickling out of them as she sniffed, then wiped her nose on the back of her glove "You'd better come in and tell me what's been going on, what's that long streak of piss done now?"

"Don't call 'im that" Molly remonstrated out of pure habit as she did every time he described Charles that way, " 'e ain't done nothing, It's not 'is fault, it's mine, I'm sort of letting 'im down and we've been fighting a fair bit and 'e's been down in Bath all day and he's staying there tonight and he ain't called me, not once" feeling the familiar wave of misery wash over her and knowing that she was over-reacting still didn't stop her bursting into a flood of tears as Eddie started conjuring up some fresh insults to call him when he saw him.

"You look like one of those girls off cable tele on Sunday afternoons, you know, a pregnant waif with her bloody dog wandering barefoot on the moors in a snowstorm looking for somewhere to kip"

"This ain't the moors and it ain't snowing, well not yet anyway, and I've got me bleeding shoes on" Molly was doing her best to appreciate Eddie's attempts at humour as he tried his best to stem the flow of tears "What the fuck's wrong with watching the footie on a Sunday like a normal bloke?"

"I like a bit of misery, me, and it makes a bloody change for you to have your shoes on, doesn't it? Now, let's have a cuppa and see what we can do about getting you home"

"I ain't got an 'ome" Another wave of self-pity caused more tears to cascade down her face.

"Of course you have you daft cow, you'll always have one here for a start, now sit down and tell me what's been going on"

-OG-

Two mugs of tea, a packet of chocolate digestives and an hour of a fairly disjointed explanation later and Molly was fast asleep in the chair in front of the fire, the dog stretched out at her feet with his eyes shut but occasionally opening one to keep a wary eye on Eddie every time he moved, as Eddie shook his head. Unfortunately he could see both sides of the problem, he couldn't help feeling sorry for Charles and his problems with caring for his mum, Eddie had always had a very strong sense of the importance of family, well he used to have until some of his relatives had sold him down the river. Never having had children of his own he had, for years now, looked on the girl asleep in front of him as a sort of surrogate daughter, although if he was being absolutely completely honest, he would have to admit that he'd always been just a little tiny bit in love with her himself, well he would have been if he'd been forty years younger, and it had been like that ever since the first day he'd met her when she came for an interview at Parkers. As things were she reminded him of his younger self, she was very feisty and very proud, hated admitting that she needed anyone's help for anything, and was intensely loyal to those she cared about, like Doreen and Bert and him and even though it pained him to admit it, that posh young bastard who'd upset her today because for all her toughness, she was very vulnerable.

Much as he felt for Charles and his dilemma over what to do for the best, although he was more than a bit worried about what was going to happen to Parker James if Charles decided to piss off back to Bath, he thought that the stupid bugger should remember that his first responsibility was to the little girl in front of him, the one that was pregnant with his baby. Eddie hadn't been too happy when they'd announced that they were going to have a baby, he was old-fashioned enough to believe that Charles should have put a ring on her finger before getting her pregnant, and he'd certainly never considered for an instant that it might have been her idea, or something that the pair of them had done deliberately, he'd assumed that it was one of those accidents that happen sometimes and that they were just putting a brave face on things.

He thought about ringing Charles, knowing that he would be worried if he did go home only to find her gone but he hadn't heard Molly's mobile ring so he had to assume that the bastard was still with his parents in Bath and hadn't rung her, so as far as Eddie was concerned it would do him good to worry a bit.

-OG-

Waking up with a very muzzy head and sore gritty eyes told Charles all he needed to know about what time he'd finally dropped off last night, or rather this morning, the alcohol hadn't helped at all, except to give him a crashing headache and a mouth like the bottom of the proverbial parrot cage. The first thing he'd done when he'd surfaced had been to put his arm out to pull Molly into his early morning embrace, as he had done hundreds of times before, only for reality to set in once again, she wasn't there and now he'd woken up too late to go to Eddie's before work. He'd just have to go into work first, he hadn't shown his face at all yesterday and he needed to go in and set the day in motion, then he'd be able to get off and collect her from Eddie's.

"You look rough, Boss" Doreen looked at him over the top of her glasses, "If you've got anything catching keep it to yourself, we don't all want it"

"I'm not ill, I'm just a bit tired that's all, bit of a late night and I didn't sleep well" He smiled at her, realising to his relief that she didn't know anything about Molly pushing off otherwise she would have been very hostile, Doreen was a founder member of the Molly Dawes fan club "Anything happen yesterday, anything urgent? Any messages?"

"There's some stuff on your desk, but nothing urgent, except can you ring Eddie as soon as you can" he'd been expecting that "Oh, and an old army mate of yours rang, said he'd call you back today"

"Did he leave his name or a number?" Charles had his fingers crossed, it was actually quite early yet so how much worse could this day get?

"Not really, but it reminded me of some town somewhere"

"Was it Mansfield?" Charles now not only had his fingers crossed but he'd closed his eyes in a silent prayer as well.

"No, I don't think so; could it have been Braintree or something like that?"

"Brains?"

"Yes, that's it" Doreen beamed as Charles grinned at her and heaved the biggest sigh of relief he could, although the logic of how Doreen's thought processes worked was, as usual, way beyond him.

"If he rings back when I'm out, give him my mobile number and tell him to ring me at any time"

-OG-

"Hello Womble"

"What you doing 'ere? And don't call me that"

"Come here"

He pulled her into his arms, feeling her initial rigid resistance soften as she slowly put her arms round his waist and rested against him. Molly closed her eyes in a vain attempt to stop yet another flood of tears from escaping and then gave up the attempt as they cascaded down her face.

"I'm sorry, please don't cry"

"I'm not crying" she sniffed "Okay I am, but I'm just so fucking emotional all the time and I'm sick of it"

"You're allowed" He smoothed her hair back from her damp face, her eyes red rimmed and swimming in tears "And I haven't helped much lately have I? I'm sorry"

"I'm sorry too and it's not that I don't care about your mum ….."

"I know you do, I've just been a complete dick, Eddie called me an arse-wipe"

"Did 'e?" she'd stopped crying and started giggling "That's a bit 'arsh even for 'im"

"Are you smirking?"

"No …. Well, yeah, maybe just a bit"

"There's nothing funny about that, it's very cruel, and you kidnapped my bloody dog"

"No I didn't, I asked 'im if 'e wanted to come with me, maybe come and live with me and Lexie and 'e said yes, even wrote me a little note to give you if you moaned" Her reference to a long ago conversation about Parsnip made them laugh as he tightened his arms round her again and was reminded of the evenings when they'd talked bollocks to each other until they'd started laughing and then they'd laughed till they'd both been in danger of wetting themselves, the night they'd giggled themselves stupid having a snowball fight in the garden at midnight when they'd been pissed and it had been pitch dark, just in case the snow was gone by the morning, and the lunchtime when they'd had fast and furious baby making sex in the office and he could feel the prickling at the back of his eyes at the thought of how close he'd come to fucking it all up.

"Parsnip wants to come home with me" He bit his lip as he tried to keep a straight face and then sniggered slightly "He told me, and he wants you to come home as well, he says he'll cry himself to sleep tonight if you don't"

"Are you trying to blackmail me?"

"Did it work?" He raised his eyebrows as she pretended to consider her answer.

"I suppose so, I mean, I suppose I'd better come 'ome with 'im, I've always been a pushover for that bleeding dog"

"What about me?" Charles smirked "Are you a pushover for me too?"

"Looks like it, dunnit?"

"I love you, you know that don't you?"

"Yeah"

Charles would have given anything to hear Molly say that she loved him too, and although he knew that it wasn't going to happen, he couldn't help wondering what it would take for her to say those words and give him that reassurance he so badly needed.

"And you and Lexie were never going to live on your own, you know that too don't you?"

"Yeah"

-OG-

"Are you going back into work later?"

"Nope"

"Why not you lazy bugger? You had the day off yesterday"

"I'm tired; I didn't sleep very well last night after you decided to scare the shit out of me like that"

"Sorry, but you do know that If you're not there" Molly smirked at him "Every other bugger will just have a long lunch hour and then piss off 'ome early"

"Really? How do you know?"

"I used to work there, didn't I?" The smirking had now turned to a full blown attack of the giggles "That's what we used to do all the time"

"Lovely, maybe we need to get a manager, someone who'll crack the bloody whip when I'm not there"

"Can we afford one?"

"Probably not"

They were sharing a chair at home in Bow and Molly was curled up in his lap as he idly played with her hair, turning the strands round his fingers and making ringlets. Neither of them wanted to be the first to bring up the elephant in the room and risk spoiling their harmony, a hard won harmony that had been missing from their relationship for the past couple of weeks. Molly was the first to crack under the need to stop pretending it wasn't there.

"Will we need a manager, I mean, are you going back to Bath?"

"I have no fucking clue what's going to happen Moll, I wish I did, I know I panicked last week and that we can't just throw everything away and rush off back to Bath, I mean it's not even necessary right now, but we will have to sort something out eventually, she isn't going to get any better. And what do you mean, are _you_ going back to Bath? I'm not going anywhere without you"

"What about your dad?"

"What about him? Now he really is an arse-wipe"

"Maybe 'e's finding it 'ard as well, I mean 'e's not used to 'aving to think about other people or doing stuff for other people, is 'e?"

"What you're trying to say is that he's a selfish fucker of an arse-wipe and you're right, he is"

"Your language has gone a bit shit since I first met you, hasn't it?"

"What do you expect living with you?"

"Nice ….. Posh twat" She giggled "Anyway your dad isn't as bad as my dad, now 'e really is a selfish fucker"

"Tell me about him"

"Yeah I will, but just not now, we've 'ad enough bleeding miseries for one day"

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Thank you so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it, and hope you enjoyed this chapter.**


	5. Chapter 5

"We could go down to Bath at the weekend if you like"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I mean it's not like we gotta worry about taking too much 'ave we? Just a couple of 'undred nappies and she'll be fine"

Lexie Elizabeth James was born ten days late when her mother had decided that she was never, ever putting in an appearance. Charles had suggested that maybe an action replay of her conception would encourage her, but Molly insisted that making a trip into the office at lunchtime when he wouldn't be able to get anywhere near her and anyway she had no intention of having sex up against a door, was completely out of the question. Charles had no idea why she was so convinced that their one-off lunchtime activity had created Lexie when, to quote his old colleague Stan, they had been at it like rabbits for weeks, but she kept insisting that her mum had told her that she'd know because she'd always known and let's face it she'd had enough practice.

-OG-

A few days after her running away to Eddie's, Charles had taken the bull by the horns and called her mother, knowing that he was taking his life in his hands, or at least he was taking a hell of a risk that Molly would be so absolutely livid with him that she might never forgive him, because since the news about his own mother he'd had this sense of not wanting to leave things to chance or until it was too late. He was also convinced that Molly needed her mother as well as her grandmother, and that Lexie should know and be part of her wider family, the knowledge that Betsy was ill had made everything seem very fragile. Belinda had promptly burst into tears when Charles had introduced himself, she seemed to know who he was and all about him and all about Lexie, which he presumed was courtesy of Nan. She'd immediately begged him to bring Molly over for lunch, or dinner or tea, whatever they liked, the following day or if necessary the day after, but as quickly as they could manage, which left Charles unable to avoid owning up to what he'd done without any sort of delay or time to prepare the ground.

"You 'ad no bleeding right"

"I know"

"So, why the fuck did you do it then?"

"I thought it was time"

"YOU thought it was time, it was none of YOUR bleeding business"

Charles decided to pay his trump card, the one he hoped would make her forgive him anything, at least for the time being.

"I thought Lexie should have as big a family as possible, I mean, my side is pathetic, even before mum got sick, basically there aren't exactly hordes of us are there? I thought we should introduce her to her Dawes family when she's born, balance things up a bit"

"I wouldn't 'ave called my lot balanced exactly"

"Tell me about you and your Mum; tell me what happened, why you don't see her"

"You wouldn't understand"

"Try me"

"I got out once, I didn't wanna go back" She looked at him through eyes that weren't really seeing anything in front of her "You had no sodding right to interfere"

"So tell me, and tell me about your dad"

"Where I grew up, people spent a lot of time screaming at each other, where keeping stuff private meant me dad yelling fuck off at the neighbours, where family meant that 'e'd tell me mum that 'e loved her right after 'e'd walloped 'er one because he was rat-arsed and didn't know what 'e was doing, then 'e'd tell the neighbours to mind their own fucking business and to do one, and then 'im and me mum would 'ave sex where I could 'ear them" She took a deep breath "I don't know how she could, the way 'e treated her ….." She took a deep breath and shook her head "It weren't really me mum what made me leave, but she didn't do anything to stop 'im, me dad I mean, nothing. She just stood there when 'e was saying all this shit about me not thinking I could come crawling back and all because I wouldn't do what 'e wanted. I wouldn't do it , so 'e said I 'ad to choose, choose what he wanted and I could 'ave me family or I was on me own, so I chose on me own and Mum did nothing, nothing at all"

"What did he want you to do?"

"Get back with this arsehole ex what I'd dumped because he was shagging me best mate and who wanted me back and who'd promised me dad a bit of this insurance scam 'e 'ad running if 'e got me to do it, so when I said to get stuffed, me dad weren't thrilled"

"What happened to make you so scared when we were stuck in that lift?"

"It was a long time ago"

"I remember you said you'd been like that since you were very little"

Sitting on his lap with his arms round her, Molly suddenly found the story of being shut in the cupboard pouring out as she re-lived every second, knowing that even though it had been a very long time ago, more than long enough for her to get over it, the horror and fear were still there as the tears ran unchecked down her face. Charles stroked her hair and held her as he wished desperately that he could go back and change the past, fix it, and then wished that he hadn't interfered; if her father was at home when they visited he wasn't sure he would be able to control his reactions to the man she called a selfish fucker.

He'd spent a very long time telling her all his worries and fears about his own mother and what her future held and what the consultant had told him and how his father had behaved and how angry that had made him, and she'd just put her arms round him, not saying a word, not trying to 'make it all better' just listening. He knew that there was nothing she could say that would change anything and he didn't want her to try because that would have meant that he would have had to play down his own worries to comfort and reassure her.

In the end their visit to east Ham passed off without incident, her father wasn't there, he'd stayed in the pub, so it was just Belinda and her sisters who were waiting for them. They'd sat in the car for ages before they'd gone in, her face white and set so that her eyes looked enormous and anguished, dark shadows under them showing how little sleep she'd had the night before.

"Hey, you sure this isn't bandit country? I mean, will the car still be here when we get back, and will it still have four wheels?"

Molly shrugged and gave him a weak smile; he got less and less sure that he'd done the right thing, as he tried to remind her of the times when he'd driven her home to her 'cupboard' in Hackney.

"Dunno, but just remember this was your bleeding idea, okay? And they're gonna think you're some sort of posh knob, you do know that, don't you?"

"What, like you did when I first met you?"

"Well I was right wasn't I?"

"No"

They'd climbed up a set of foul smelling concrete steps and suddenly her mother and sisters were there on the balcony in front of them and they all, including Molly, immediately burst into tears and hugged each other without saying a word. He stood watching and feeling like a bit like a spare part as he recognised how alike they looked and sounded and how young Belinda was compared to Betsy, who had aged a lot in the past year or so. A short while later the hugs and tears started all over again as her brothers came rushing in from taking part in or watching some school football match, as the entire family, minus her dad of course, all talked at the same time, no-one listening to a word that anyone else was saying as Molly kept beaming happily at him, occasionally going over to where he was leaning so that she could hug him. He didn't say very much, he didn't need to, anyway no-one would have been able to hear a word above the racket of the seven of them all talking nineteen to the dozen at the tops of their voices, the boys bickering as they vied with each other trying to recount some story to their eldest sister, so he just stood and smiled and watched her, it was enough.

-OG-

"Have you rung your mum and dad yet?"

"No, I mean, Mum might not understand, you know what she was like yesterday, and I don't think Dad will be there"

"Will you stop it, you need to call and tell them"

Lexie was an hour old and had finally stopped screaming the place down, which had been a very welcome sound to them bearing in mind how floppy, pale and silent she'd been when an exhausted Molly had finally pushed her out, giving Charles a heart-stopping period of anxiety before she'd started screaming at full volume because she was being manhandled and suctioned by a midwife who was telling her to "Come on darlin' " and then "I might have to …..." as Lexie gave him another heart-stopping moment, this time of utter relief, when she started screaming with pure outrage, turning first pink and then scarlet with fury.

Now he couldn't make up his mind who she was most like as she lay in her mother's arms drifting off to sleep after being fed and dribbling slightly out of a rosebud mouth; she had her mum's nose and chin and his eyes and curls, but Molly reckoned she looked exactly like him when he was pissed and falling asleep in a chair, except that she was utterly beautiful. Charles agreed about the beautiful bit, even if he privately thought she looked a lot like his dad as he fell asleep after Sunday lunch.

"Go and tell your mum, you don't need to talk to your dad if you don't want to, but you must tell your mum, cos it might not happen again, well not for at least another ten years, if ever"

"What? We're not having any more?" Charles raised his eyebrows and smirked at her as she cuddled their sleeping daughter "I thought we were going to have a big family"

"Did you? Well you'll have to find someone else to 'ave them with then, cos it ain't gonna be me. I ain't doing that again in an 'urry, and anyway I'm not even gonna have sex again, especially not if you keep on calling me a bleeding Womble"

-OG-

Lexie and Molly had been home for over two weeks and had sort of established a routine, Lexie slept beautifully most of the day and was awake nearly all night, requiring feeding every couple of hours with frequent nappy changes which meant that her parents had grey faces and sleep deprived eyes. Charles was intensely grateful for the presence of Brains in the print works. He had taken him on in a sort of General Manager, assistant to the Boss, foreman type of 'arse kicker in general' role, and even though they couldn't afford him, Charles thought it could be the best move he'd made since he'd bought into Parkers, not counting Molly of course. Parker James was finally making a profit and was even paying Charles a salary, even if it was far less than most of the staff could begin to imagine, and any rise he'd planned had been diverted to pay for Brains.

He trusted him and the staff liked him, respected him, probably even more than they respected Charles who they'd known since he was the 'hatchet man from Head Office' that had gone all soft and bought the place with Eddie and then waltzed off with Molls. Molly and Brains had immediately got on like a house on fire, as Charles had known they would, sometimes he felt it was a little bit too well when they ganged up on him because Molly thought he was being a bit pompous.

They hadn't seen much of the Dawes family although Molly spoke to them frequently and the female members of the family, Charles still hadn't yet met Dave, had visited Bow to coo and fawn over Lexie who repaid their adoring attention by screaming blue bloody murder as they passed her around until Mollie had to take her back and pacify her by feeding her, even though she wasn't due a feed and wasn't hungry so she'd fallen asleep immediately she'd latched on. Nan had laughed saying that she was just like Molly had been as a baby, but Belinda had argued, saying instantly that she'd been perfect, that all her babies had been perfect so that Molly had raised her eyebrows, that wasn't quite how she remembered things from when the little bleeders had been tiny.

-OG-

He had got into a habit of ringing his mum every other day because any more than that and she complained that they'd got nothing to tell each other and that she felt he was checking up on her, which he was, but he knew it wasn't the right thing to be doing, there was time enough for daily calls if, or when, things got more tricky. Sometimes, unfortunately fairly rarely, there were really good days when Betsy chatted and laughed and asked after Molly by name, and then asked after Lexie and even the dog, and some days when she was extremely vague and wasn't sure if she could remember who this adult son was, seeing him as a schoolboy or a young soldier at Sandhurst and constantly telling him to be careful, and he found it very hard to come to terms with the fact that the consultant had warned him that there might well come a time when she wouldn't be sure who he was at all. He was having to learn to take each day as it was and not to attempt to plan and control everything as he so desperately wanted to do. He hadn't properly repaired his relationship with his father, they were cordial and polite to each other, something that Charles thought might be about to be turned upside down again during the coming weekend.

Taking Lexie to Bath to meet his parents wasn't anything like the travelling light scenario that Molly had described; in fact, to Charles it felt a bit like moving house the amount of stuff which was apparently essential for one tiny baby, and a dog. He and Molly had had a huge row which she'd won, so that Parsnip was in his bed in the hatch of the car, dog guard in place and Charles was dreading what his father was going to say. He had a nasty suspicion that there might well be a scene, it wasn't that his dad was scared of dogs like Doreen was, he just disapproved, but his mum loved them and Molly felt that they should go and see her as a whole family, dog included, and that his dad would get over it …. eventually.

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Thank you for your reviews, I know that it's a tricky subject but I'm glad that so many of you are enjoying following the dilemma of someone in the family suffering from a horrible illness which affects everyone in that family, albeit in different ways.**


	6. Chapter 6

Charles breathed out properly for the first time for what felt like weeks as he watched Betsy sitting in the rocking chair in the kitchen, the baby cradled up against her shoulder sucking her little fist and Parsnip leaning his body weight against her left leg, and knew that she had been worrying at his peace of mind since the last time he'd been in this kitchen, that he'd needed to see for himself that she was okay. Lexie had slept peacefully all the way in the car, and had then started screaming the second he'd lifted the car seat out as he'd rushed to get her out of the bitter cold wind and into the warmth of the kitchen. She was announcing her presence to the residents of Royal Crescent, not only her grandparents but their immediate neighbours, by protesting very loudly at her hunger, her wet bum and the cessation of the motion which had kept her so comfortably snoozing for the last few hours.

Molly had followed with the dog on his lead, a dog that wasn't too sure he liked the feel of the slippery tiles under his feet so that he kept sitting down on a 'doing as he was told' strike until Molly told him to please 'his bloody self' and unclipped his lead and walked away, leaving him sitting there so that eventually he'd got up and followed her.

"She's 'ungry, can you 'old 'er for a bit while I get sorted? I need to find the nappies 'n that" Molly had immediately released Lexie from her seat harness and passed her to her grandmother who sat down and instinctively cradled the crying baby up to her face with one hand under her bum and one holding her head and quite literally beamed at Charles, so that he'd realised how long it had been since he'd last seen that sort of expression of sheer joy on her face, and mouthed a silent 'thank you' at Molly who shrugged and mouthed 'What?' as if she didn't know what he was thanking her for. Lexie stopped crying as her grandmother jiggled her gently and Charles asked where his father was, wanting to get the issue of the dog sorted as soon as possible hoping that his father would be swayed by the look of pleasure on his mum's face as Parsnip put his head on her knee and nudged her with his nose, asking to be petted.

"Give it a bloody rest Parsnip" Molly took Lexie from her grandmother to change her bum and feed her as the baby started to fuss again, then gave up on the idea of the pre-feed nappy change as Lexie roared her disapproval of the delay in the provision of lunch, and Betsy started to slowly stroke Parsnip's head, gently playing with his ears which he loved.

An hour later and they were sitting in the huge lounge in front of a roaring log fire, a clean, dry and replete Lexie sleeping peacefully in her grandmother's arms with Parsnip asleep across Betsy's feet as Molly curled up in a chair dozing slightly and Charles listened out for his father's return from the golf course. He knew he couldn't possibly be much longer, it was getting dark and it was bitterly cold outside, and Charles wondered just how much time Betsy spent here on her own, and what the bloody hell he could do about it.

-OG-

"You are taking her to this memory clinic thing that the consultant told me about, aren't you?"

"Well, no, it's a bit tricky …."

"No Dad, it's not, it's bloody important that she goes and you need to talk to her GP about all the other things that are out there that might help"

"What did you bring that flaming dog for?"

"Don't change the subject, and we bought Parsnip because Mum likes dogs and it's too expensive to keep putting him in kennels when we come down, and he hates it"

"She's getting worse, you know"

"Well, how much time does she spend here on her own? She's probably lonely, needs someone to talk to, you might gonna need to change your social life a bit"

" _Might gonna need to"_ Bill raised his eyebrows as he repeated the phrase "What sort of grammar is that?"

"That's Molly speak" Charles snorted a laugh down his nose "I hadn't realised that I'd caught it"

"She's a nice girl, Charles, you're very lucky; you want to hold onto this one"

"I know, and I'm going to" Charles shrugged, knowing that his father had successfully changed the subject away from Charles' mother and his wife of forty one years, yet again.

-OG-

Their monthly visits to Bath went mostly without incident so that they were somewhat lulled into a false sense of security, Betsy had good days and bad days, although most of the days that they were there and she had her beloved Lexie and her, almost more beloved, Parsnip in the house were really good ones. She loved nothing more than going out for long walks with Charles and the dog; when, without speaking, she appeared to be almost back to her old self. Charles would have loved to suggest that his mum and dad got a dog of their own for his mother, but knew that his father wouldn't co-operate with that idea and he couldn't leave it to chance that the dog would be properly looked after and he certainly didn't want to argue over inessential stuff; there were going to be more important issues to address, probably sooner rather than later.

The wake-up call for his father came on one hot and sunny afternoon in June when Charles was sweating at Parker James and Molly was sitting under an umbrella in the garden with Lexie, who was wearing just a nappy, as she kicked and gurgled on a blanket and Parsnip stretched out in the shade of the large tree at the end of the lawn. Quite what the tree was neither of them had a clue; they kept meaning to look it up and kept forgetting.

"What, what happened?"

Charles had come home early and had thrown his jacket on the blanket as he sat down next to Lexie and checked to see who had been calling him repeatedly while he was driving home.

"Shit"

Molly had been on her way into the house to get him a drink but stopped at his tone of voice and stood still, waiting to see what was happening.

"I'll call later; see how she is, okay? But, Dad, we're going to have to think about this, you can't pretend and hope it'll all go away"

-OG-

"What's 'appened?"

Charles rubbed the back of his neck and accepted the hand up which Molly was offering him as he bent down and picked up Lexie and blew raspberries on her tummy, making her gurgle and giggle, and bringing a smile to his face.

"She went to the local shop after lunch and then couldn't remember where she lived or how to get home, she got really upset apparently, she was probably scared, poor mum, and because they know her a bit they looked in her phone and tried to call dad, but they couldn't find him, the bugger wasn't answering, probably because he thought it was her calling. Two hours she was there before they called the police who managed to get hold of him straight away so that he went and got her, he says he was on council business and had turned his phone off, but I'm not so sure."

"Poor Betsy, she must 'ave been so scared"

"Yep. He's going to have to face facts; she needs much more help than he's giving her"

"Well that wouldn't be 'ard would it?"

"Nope"

The wake-up call brought a silver lining in the shape of Karolina, a Polish woman who was almost the same age as Betsy and who'd worked for years in a care home which meant that she had extensive experience of being with people with the same sort of condition and who'd been looking for a live-in position as a companion and carer. Bill had been very resistant at first, even though she'd been outstandingly better than anyone else they'd interviewed, arguing that Betsy didn't need full time care and that Karolina was far too expensive as well as needing to live-in and that she was a lot older than he'd had in mind for a glorified au pair. Charles had found interviewing potential carers difficult enough without his father's negative attitude to everyone and everything and had eventually lost his temper and pointed out that it wasn't up to his Dad who they chose, that Betsy had chosen Karolina and that his dad could well afford her if he didn't want to substantially increase the amount of time he spent at home, and it appeared that he didn't, and that she wasn't going to be there as an au pair for him to ogle.

Knowing that Karolina was with Betsy made Charles relax in a way he'd forgotten, and his father eventually stopped ignoring him or disappearing out when they visited Bath, the heart melting power of Lexie's smiles and Parsnip together beginning to win him over. The timing of Bill's about-turn coincided with Molly's private amusement at the way Karolina responded to Charles' presence, how flustered she got and how deeply she blushed whenever he spoke to her. Charles seemed oblivious to it and Molly's prior experience with him and Doreen made her decide to keep it to herself, to keep her mouth shut to stop Charles running scared of yet another middle aged woman who'd apparently developed a crush on him, he'd already got two with Doreen and her Nan.

Molly couldn't help being aware of how much difference a bit of cash made to the options for Betsy's care, although all the money in the world wouldn't or couldn't make her better. She didn't want to tell Charles that his mum was lucky, because she wasn't, but Molly knew that if it had been her mum or Nan who were ill, they would have had to rely on family and anything the local authority offered, not getting any sort of carer in to help. Mind you at least they had some family, Betsy just had Charles and her and a totally selfish twat for a husband.

-OG-

"Your mum asked me today when we was getting married, said you told 'er we was going to after Lexie was born"

"Did I?"

"I dunno do I? It's what she said, but we don't 'ave to if you don't want to"

"Of course I want to, but I didn't think you wanted to"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"So that's a 'yes' then, is it?"

"Yes what?"

The way Betsy's memory worked never ceased to amaze Charles, he was pretty sure he'd mentioned getting married in a one line throw away comment nearly a year ago when they'd been in the car coming home from the hospital, and yet his mum seemed to remember that when she often had difficulty remembering a conversation she'd had an hour before. She no longer had difficulty remembering Molly's name or Lexie, but he wasn't sure whether that was because they had, at Karolina's suggestion, made a memory book with enlarged photographs of all the family mounted with the captions written in his "posh boy's writing" as Molly called it, so that Betsy could remind herself of who they were and their names, especially if she was having a bad day.

Karolina had gone home to Poland for a week for Christmas so that they were in Bath for the holiday with Betsy and Bill, and the Polish woman's absence was already showing in the amount of agitation Betsy showed because her normal calm routines were disturbed. Molly was also a bit disturbed at the idea of cooking Christmas lunch, she'd never attempted to cook anything the size of the bleeding monster that Bill had bought, least of all a turkey and had been frightening herself to death reading all the dire warnings about the dangers of eating it if it was undercooked, so much so that she'd already decided to practically cremate the bastard thing to be on the safe side.

-OG-

"Lunch was lovely"

"No it wasn't, it was bleeding 'orrible" Molly started giggling as she lay in bed propped up against the pillows watching him as he sat on his side of the bed and balled his socks up to try and throw them into the laundry bin without getting up and walking nearer to it.

"It wasn't horrible, it was fine, the vegetables were lovely"

"Your mum cooked the vegetables" Molly was almost crying with laughter as he wriggled on the hook trying to find something nice to say about the meal she'd cooked that sounded like the truth.

"Okay, well maybe the gravy could have done with being a bit …."

"More like gravy?" Molly was still giggling as she thought about the gravy they'd had to almost chip out of the gravy boat.

"Well, having a bit more, I don't know, water in it or something" He was now laughing because her giggling was very infectious.

"I _do_ love you"

She was still giggling as though she hadn't just thrown a complete show stopper of a comment into their conversation. Charles stopped dead as he was pulling back the duvet ready to get into bed and turned to look at her incredulously.

"What did you just say?"

"I said I love you, why, is there something wrong with that?"

"No, it's just that you've never, ever said that to me before"

"Course I 'ave, I say it all the time"

"No, you don't, you know you don't, you have _never_ said that before, not once in three years"

"Thought I 'ad" She shrugged, trying to look unconcerned "You know I love you, I wouldn't be 'ere if I didn't, would I?"

"Maybe not, it's nice to hear you say it though, say it again"

"I love you, I've always loved you, well nearly always, now get into bed you twonk"

"I love you too"

As he did as he was told and burrowed under the warmth of the duvet, Charles turned to her and began to drop tiny kisses down her cheeks and round the edges of her mouth, pulling her warm compliant body into his embrace, totally unable to switch off the huge grin that was plastered across his face. As she responded and started to kiss him back with more and more passion he was suddenly aware of her legs wrapping themselves around him and her straining towards him with an insistent unmistakeable invitation, and that he needed to try and exercise a bit of self-control.

"Oi, Oi, stop it, stop it, hang on a minute, I thought we weren't going to … that you didn't want any more in a hurry, not for another ten years at least"

"Who said that?"

"You did"

"It weren't me, I never said nothing like that" She started butterfly kissing him down his neck "I don't want Lexie to be an only"

"What like me you mean?"

"Yeah, sorry"

"Don't be, I don't want her to be one either"

-OG-

"Say it again" Charles was wreathed in a smirk as he again dropped tiny butterfly kisses on the face looking up at him with the matching smug satisfied smirk.

"No, you say it first"

"I love you"

"I love you too"

"I thought we were going to get married before we had any more kids, keep everyone happy, my mum, Eddie …."

"Your mum won't care, she'll just be 'appy if we 'ave another one, another grandchild for 'er to fuss over, and it'll be good to 'ave them while she's still ….…..… you know, and it's got sod-all to do with Eddie. Anyway we can still get married, can't we?"

"I don't know about that"

"What? What did you just say? You'd bloody better be joking"

"Of course I'm joking, I'm still in shock, say it again"

"I love you"

"I can't hear you, say it again, a bit louder this time"

"I LOVE YOU" Molly was now giggling furiously.

"Again, a bit louder" He cupped one hand round his ear.

"Piss off"

-OG-

 **Author's notes: Happy endings a speciality! I may very well re-visit this at a later date, but feel that this is a natural break in the story, so thank you for all your support and kind comments. I am now busy with a less 'serious' story which is demanding to be written, so I hope it won't be too long before I'm back, (you don't get rid of me easily).**


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